


Fix You

by niosism



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Post-Canon, The Homestuck Epilogues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:20:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25434562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/niosism/pseuds/niosism
Summary: There is a sadness that runs through him and he thinks he feels it too.
Relationships: Jake English/Dirk Strider
Kudos: 10





	Fix You

**Author's Note:**

> Fuck the epilogues, I can't write anything inherently happy anymore.

A young man stands in his bedroom. Now he is not so young anymore, but he is not old either. He is just a man. That man stands in his bedroom, which, he quickly finds out, was not the best course of action, because he is starting to become quite upset with the current state of his own misery. 

This man’s name is JAKE ENGLISH and he is TIRED. 

There is a sadness aching in his heart he does not know is there. There are times he looks in the mirror and sees someone else behind the glass. 

He can’t breathe, and yet his breath comes out of him in big huffs and gags, a true spectacle. How can anyone miss it? His breathing is right there! He hears laughter and the presence of a million joyful souls. Some laugh so hard they have a hard time standing, doubling over in their mirth, and others stand there like robots, grinning at him in his misery, unmoving, without a life of their own. 

Sometimes he wants to punch them like he used to punch Brobot back before the game began, but Brobot was a very real machine he could feel with the pads of his fingers, the knuckles of his fist. He was tangent and tactile, a physical being of fire and metal, in the fleeting image of his best friend. He was always hot to the touch, sometimes so much so that after hours of hiding above trees and running through thick forest, his iron fist would burn his human skin. Sometimes he wishes he could do it all over again. 

The souls that haunt him in the mirror are not his own, but of others. He cannot tell who is who, but can hear their cries for help.

Everytime he tries to think of what is wrong with him, a new blister forms in his heart. Is it simply the pain of facing his faults? The desire to stay ignorant and idiotic? Low and tired and angry? 

He does not know. He pokes at the newly formed bubbles in his heart. They fester and throb. He get a hold of them and twists once, twice, then lets go. A breath leaves him. Isn’t it better to bite himself inside than get out real knives? Nobody will ever know, he thinks. He is wrong. 

Dirk sees him very often, and he knows. He doesn’t ask what is wrong with him, but Jake knows that he knows. There is a certain heaviness that pulls them down, as if the new earth became twice its size and the gravity became too much.

It is so easy to ask for help, but he doesn’t. He feels pathetic. He wants to be liked, and nobody likes dealing with someone who isn’t perfect. His friends all are. They are all perfect. He is not. 

He smiles for them. He smiles especially hard for Dirk, because he is his best friend, and because they live together. He cannot stop smiling. 

Whenever he feels himself slipping, he excuses himself. A simple “I’m going to take a shower” or “visit Jade.” Dirk spends most of his time building robots anyways. He is just paranoid. 

\---

After a few months of this, however, Dirk’s fingers begin to twitch. He has a harder time working with machinery at all. His hands lose a certain conviction. Whenever he is screwing or drilling or holding parts together that need to be held with determined strength, they slip through his fingers as if his energy has been sapped.

He spends a few days not doing anything but sitting at the edge of a lake in the Consort Kingdom. It’s early spring, so when he dips his feet into the defrosting water, he feels more alive than ever before. And also slightly more dead, if that makes any sense. Either way, his feet are numb, but he’s okay with that. 

He thinks about Jake and how they have a good, healthy friendship going on. Good = having fun, taking care of their own things in their living arrangements, no fights (they are more trouble than they are worth), going on adventures. Healthy = no fights. 

_ Hold on, is that even a good thing, honestly? In this current state of tension? One of you is going to snap soon and you know it.  _

Dirk looks around him at the nature that has grown exceptionally well in the 5000 year timeskip they all hopped into. A suspicious-looking plant dances in the light breeze. At Dirk’s gaze she stops moving as if caught in a crime.

“What”

_ If one of you is sick, you’re both going to get it! You need to be honest about your feelings if you want things to go back to how they were.  _

“Who is there?”

_ Nobody. Forget the idea that this voice talking to you can be anything but your own consciousness.  _

Dirk, thinking that he might be going crazy from the frostbite starting to eat at his feet, doesn’t respond. He shoves his feet back inside his shoes and stands up. His legs nearly give out from the numbness. He blinks hard. His eyeballs are cold and there are tears forming behind them to keep them from freezing. His freckles are a dark contrast against the pale blue weather. 

_ Hey, don’t walk away from me. I can talk to you no matter where you go.  _

“Fuck off.”

_ Dirk, please. I want to help.  _

“I have done everything myself my entire life. Don’t patronize me.” 

_ This is exactly why you are all suffering. Nobody ever asks for help. _

“I don’t need help. If any of my friends do, I will be happy to aid them. Why don’t you go ask them if they need help and leave me alone?”

_ You know your friends need you. Why do you ignore them? _

Dirk grunts in annoyance and drags himself back to his home. He tries not to think the entire way there in hopes his “consciousness” will stop trying to fully re-admit splinters of himself into his life. He has had enough of those to last a lifetime.

_ Why do you still hold a grudge against yourself? _

“Jesus christ. Why are you in my head? Please insert yourself in an inanimate object so I can snap you in half.” 

_ I’m afraid I can’t do that, Dirk.  _

“Fuck you.”

_ What if I told you I wasn’t actually you but someone else’s consciousness that so happens to be able to talk to you inside your own head?  _

“I’d have less of a desire to kill you, but that can’t be the case. You sound too much like Hal.” 

_ Maybe that’s just because you and Hal are the same person. _

_ “ _ Listen, I’m not going to put up with you this time, so just tell me what you want and leave me alone.” 

Dirk kicks his shoes off once he closes the door behind him. They bounce against the wall and roll over into the carpet, colored a hideous green Dirk has gotten used to. Jake was the one who came up with the idea that it would make sense for them to live together; they were both important figureheads for the Consort Kingdom and no one else. At first Dirk thought it was a bad idea, especially since he had gotten used to living alone all his life, but it was hard turning Jake down when he was so excited about everything around him. 

_ You still like him, don’t you? _

“No, he’s my friend. Now go away.”

_ If you promise to stop being a wuss and stop lying to yourself.  _

Dirk laughs. “Your choice of vocabulary is atrocious.” 

_ Dirk, you’rE tHE oNLy ONe That cAN hELP yOUr FrienDS. _

_ “ _ Seriously? Are you really short-circuiting on me? Thank god.”

gOd iS noT Real, juST You

A shudder runs through him. He was starting to think it could be another consciousness coming to haunt him from the vastness of paradox space, but now he’s not so sure.

He thinks he will have decapitated Dirk pinatas for all his future birthdays.

\---

Thanks to Jade’s influence, Jake has picked up gardening as a hobby. Now when he is not out adventuring with or without Dirk, he grows plants in his backyard greenhouse. Or, at least he calls it a greenhouse. It’s mostly just a bunch of glass panels that keep critters away from ruining all of his hard work. He wishes Jade would come over more often to help out and gawk at the blooming buds, but she seems intensely preoccupied with her two bickering boyfriends. Jake assumes, and sweats, but doesn’t let it sit in his mind too much. These days it is hard not to worry about everything and nothing. 

He is barely ever home. When he is, he is never actually inside the house, but furiously digging at the earth and rolling around in the mud. Perhaps he should raise some pigs and let them take over for him. Dirk would probably think it’s uh, amusing. Entertaining.

He ought to make his debut as an entertainer for the masses. Someone to keep them content and busy while they watch him behind a screen. Idleness is the worst demon of all. At least watching TV keeps the mind distracted. He could be the host of a traveling by foot documentary, or teach people about the creatures of the wild from a script like the old earth’s crocodile hunter whose name escapes him. But in truth, he doesn’t think he has what it takes. He loved red-dead and dirty adventure as a lone ranger, or with his friends, but as a teacher? As someone who has vowed to be the #1 most adventure savvy man in all of Earth C? He couldn’t. 

He could do something with Dirk, if his friend was willing. They could co-host a comedy skit show or something. It hasn’t been too long since they all time-skipped 5000 years in the future, but man did it get dark and dreary fast. For him, at least. He found a fulfilment in making others happy, and so he would do whatever it took to accomplish that.

He digs four fingers into the wet earth and hears a door slam from the inside. The soil squishes with the quick swipe of his hand. The flowers sigh. Sometimes he thinks Tinkerbull might appear in the midst of them, asking him if he has seen his old friend Tavros. He has believed in fairies since he was a child, even talking and making friends with them in his treks through the island. It was lonely, but having a wild imagination made it less so. 

“Dirk?”

He pulls out his fingers in one swift motion. There is soil in his forehead and weeds under his boots. They look as if they are wrapping around his feet.

He hasn’t seen Dirk at all in almost a week now, and if he allowed himself to think about how weird it is considering they live in the same house, he would wonder where he went, but he doesn’t. Jake himself goes off in his own lone adventures at times, and he knows Dirk values his privacy, going by how he always locks himself inside his room and keeps the locksmith industry in business. 

Jake wipes his hands down his trousers and wanders back inside to check on the sudden noise. The house had been eerily quiet for a while before now, so that must mean Dirk is back. 

He trudges through the house, leaving a trail of earthy footsteps in his wake. 

“Dirk, are you there?”

No response. It takes a while for Jake to climb up all the stairs to get to Dirk’s room, which is basically in the attic, touching the roof. When Jake comes face to face with his door, he stops for a second. 

“Dirk?”

“What is it, Jake?” Dirk’s deep voice echoes through the door.

“Oh, nothing. I was just checking if it was really you that came back there.”

“Who else would I be? Who else would come back here except for you and me?”

“Uh, right.” 

Silence.

“Um, are you doing alright, Dirk?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

Dirk replies with another question. Answering a question with another question is obviously not the way to go, Dirk knows that. He knows it is a very immature and stupid thing to do. He also doesn’t care. 

“It’s just that I haven’t seen you in a while.”

A few seconds later, the door opens. 

“You see me now.” 

“O-oh.” Jake laughs quietly. He doesn’t know why he laughs. “Hello.”

“Jake, we should talk.”

“Oh, um, alright.”

Dirk opens the door more widely for Jake to come inside. Jake hesitates and nearly walks right into Dirk when he lets go of the door and goes to sit in his cool gamer chair. God, why is he so awkward? Why are they so awkward sometimes? In person? I mean, it was still pretty awkward whenever they exchanged messages on pesterchum too, but this is too much. They’ve been living together for a while now, one would think the tension would waft away once and for all. 

“I can hear you.” 

_ Shit. Awkward. _

Jake blinks. “What?”

_ Nothing. _

“Forget it. Let me do this myself.”

“Do what?”

“Nothing.” Dirk feels himself growing tipsy.

Jake opens his mouth, then closes it. Before he can begin to worry, Dirk says, “I’m just a little overheated, okay? With these robots. It’s making my head numb. Don’t take it personally. Just- listen,”

Jake’s eyes are like saucers. He is listening.

“I have this voice in my head that narrates my life. It- I don’t know where it comes from but recently it’s been telling me to- I have this feeling that I can’t keep inside anymore. It’s not for my sake, but for yours and Roxy and Jane and Dave and all of our friends.” 

Jake is blinking at him like he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. He grows a bit nervous. When Dirk hesitates, Jake takes the chance to say, “ You know, Dirk, that sounds awfully familiar.”

“Yeah, I know-”

“No, I mean, for me personally. In my head I-”

“This happens to you too? No way.”

“No, golly, let me talk.”

Dirk thinks that is a bit hypocritical of him but he doesn’t say anything.

“Sometimes I have flashbacks and dreams about my life before the game started. Fighting with Brobot and watching a mountain of movies alone and pretending to be Lara Croft adventuring in the island. Even when I don’t see you, it seems you are still somehow in my dreams as an omnipotent presence, which sometimes can be… unsettling.” 

Dirk’s skin is cold. He glances at his coat lying on the floor. The temperature inside is fine, it’s Jake’s words that  _ unsettle _ him. 

_ Yikes. _

“Shut up.”

“Pardon?”

“Bro you can’t tell me you’ve never had a craving to… tell the voices to shut up.”

Jake gapes at him. 

“Playing codfish? We should go catch some.”

“Dirk.”

Dirk turns his back to Jake and searches his table for his phone. He readjusts his shades. He thinks he’s forgotten to blink because his eyes burn.

“Dirk, are you okay?”

“Yes! I’m fine!”

“You’re saying some strange things.”

“So are you! Ha ha oh man. Me, an omnipresent presence in your life! I should just leave.” 

When he comes into contact with his phone, the sheer impact of his hand sends it flying to Jake’s feet. Jake picks it up and is about to hand it to Dirk when he snatches the phone from his hands.

“Dirk, don’t leave! Why are you being so jumpy?”

“I’m not jumpy. You’re just insufferable.” Dirk types at his phone’s keyboard. Bright blue letters mirror in his shades. Jake does not notice. 

_ Here it is. The first and last fight since this bizarre arrangement started. _

“I’m insufferable? You’re the one that’s avoiding my questions and being a complete basketcase!” 

“I’m coping. What are you talking about?”

“Will you put the phone down and talk to me?”

“It can wait.”

Jake tries very hard not to be offended. He fails. 

“No it can’t! Who are you talking to?”

“Stop asking me questions!”

“Stop avoiding them!”

Dirk puts his phone down in his pocket and starts to climb out of the window. Avoidance like a pro. 

“Dirk!!”

Jake lunges to stop him, grabbing onto his legs with all the strength Dirk used to have. Dirk struggles a little but not enough to do anything to Jake’s hold.  _ What kind of monster strength? _

“Calm down, I do this all the time.”

Jake hadn’t realized he had his eyes shut tight until he opened them at Dirk’s words. His hold loosens considerably. “Oh.”

“Hold on.”

“What- YIPES!”

Dirk jumps out and Jake nearly falls off of him to face a long fall of trauma injury but manages to hold onto his pants before his hands slip. Both his arms and legs are wrapped tightly around Dirk’s legs as he hangs on for dear life. 

Jake takes a moment to realize they are not falling, but rather, flying. Dirk has both his hands grasping onto a two-sided handle that zips from his window to the roof of another building. Their clothes flap at the speed of the zipline.

When they get close enough for Dirk to jump off and land on the open roof, Jake’s breath hitches at the fear of impact. It’s less because of the speed they are going or the jump and more because his hands were beginning to slip and were bringing Dirk’s pants down with him. 

Before Jake can unintentionally flash his best friend, however, Dirk lets go of the handle and they both drop some five feet above the roof of the building.

Jake touches the ground first, miscalculates the fall, and puts too much pressure on one foot, twisting it at an odd angle. Dirk steps down gracefully after, crouching down entirely like a catwoman poster pose, shades glinting in the setting sun. 

He barely registers Jake’s grunts behind him as he stands and pulls his pants up from where Jake had pulled them down to his upper thighs. He goes to button his pants but realizes the button has popped off. Great, this was his favorite pair. He’ll have to pay Rose and Kanaya a visit so they can teach him how to sew on a button. 

Dirk turns around to see a limping Jake massaging his left ankle. 

“Shit Jake, you good?”

He reaches out for his friend, barely having touched his arms to help him up when Jake gives him a death glare. 

“I could’ve died!”

“Stop being dramatic, the fall from my bedroom is like 10 meters at most.”

Jake wishes he were Brobot so he could give him a good smack. 

“This was less than a meter high and I sprained my bloody ankle!” 

“You’re an adventurer, dude.”

“Fuck!”

“Woah, okay, here.”

Dirk snakes an arm under his armpit around to his back and has him lean on him. 

“It gets cold at night. Let’s hurry back and fix your ankle.” 

“And then we talk?”

Something brief and icy wraps itself around Dirk’s neck and slithers down his back. He wants to run. He wants to leave and never come back. 

“Yeah. Okay.” 

\----

They make it back alive. Dirk holding onto Jake like a lifeline, his arm around his back, gripping tightly to his ribs, arm under his armpit. It’s not like Jake can’t walk, it’s just, if there is anything Dirk can do to not feel like a fucking villain, he will take that chance. Something struck him after his attempt at escape, a tiny seed of hope for a better life, a better friendship, a world where not every single one of his friends felt like they had left their lives behind as soon as the game ended. What was there for them to do now? He thought, and realized they were all probably thinking the same thing. They had created a world, but what else is there? How does one not feel like complete shit all the damn time? All he knows is that he doesn’t want to run anymore. He wants to keep fighting, even if he has to be miserable for the entire rest of his life. He will keep fighting. 

He walks as near to the couch as he can so that Jake can be seated there without flopping to the floor, and drops his hold on him unceremoniously. Jake can’t say he is surprised, but a little yelp still comes out of him as he lands sideways on the cushions. 

“T-thanks.” he says, propping himself to an upright position with his arms. 

“What are friends for?” Dirk replies, feeling oddly and suddenly, a whole lot more cheerful than before. Jake looks at him funny, as if he can tell the difference, because of course, what kind of roommate would he be if he couldn’t tell a change in his best friend’s mood? This naturally gets to him as well and he smiles. Dirk goes to the kitchen, which is connected to the living room Jake is at, and opens a few drawers, looking for a First Aid Kit. 

As he does this, there is a creeping, unsettling feeling that starts to come over him, but he does his best to push it away. He can barely make out the whispering of his own head before it wafts away like a puff of air. He lets out a deep breath. 

“You okay there?” Jake calls out from the couch. Is his breathing really that loud?

“Of course, no worries.” he replies, not even thinking about it. He knows his problems won’t suddenly get fixed as soon as he has an epiphany, but he can at least feel that it is becoming easier, and so is Jake. It’s like they are connected. They can feel each other’s troubles they never speak about. 

Maybe the voice in his head had been right for once about fights leading to catharsis. He feels warmer than he has felt in months, maybe even years. Holding an injured Jake and helping to take care of another person feels good. What does he know? He had never had anyone else to take care of his entire life before this, just a vast expanse ocean, of fish he would eat for food. 

“Got it.” he strides back to Jake’s side, setting the kit on Jake’s lap and pulling up his leg. 

“The other one, Dirk.” Jake lifts up his other leg for him to catch.

“Oh, right.” He puts his one leg down and takes the other one. There is a brief moment of awkward giddiness in which either of them could laugh naturally, but it is still a little tense between them, like there are too many unspoken feelings, and it would be so simple to fix, so easy to just come out and say...

There is a moment of silence as Dirk works on Jake’s ankle; cleaning, patching, he even blows on it at one point, which makes Jake flinch and laugh, once; it tickles a little. 

“You’re so good with your hands, why do you not use them to help humans? Why is it only robots?” 

Dirk’s hands still.  _ That’s a good question _ , he thinks. He doesn’t know the answer. Instead, he gives another question.

“Who would want someone like me taking care of their shit? I don’t like feeling like I owe anybody.”

He pats Jake’s leg to tell him he’s done, and Jake puts his leg back down.

“You don’t owe anyone, Dirk. Did you patch me up because you felt like you owed me and not because you felt it in your heart that you cared enough to help, out of your own volition?” 

His  _ heart _ , he thinks, he has one of those, is he using it in this moment? Is he not just doing something for the sake of covering his own ass?  _ Jake English, you are a beacon of hope.  _

He feels a little silly as he says this, but he couldn’t give two shits right now;

“You’re a cool guy, Jake. I did that for you.” 

It doesn’t sound as ironic as he intends for it to. Deep in his heart he knows it’s not.

“And you are one hell of a fella, Dirk.”

When he looks at Jake through his shades, he is smiling, and he feels his own lips twitch as if he were staring at a mirror. 

“What do you say we co-host a reality TV show, my guy, that would be totally rad.” 

Jake beams like he has just read his mind, because he had. When he scooches closer to hug his best bro, he allows himself to feel things he has repressed for so long, and holds him there to bask in the presence of his loved, loved comrade. 

Dirk wraps his arms around him slowly. He hasn’t had many chances to practice physical affection since he met his friends face-to-face because he would deprive himself of it like a phobia, but this is nice. This is good. 

“I’ll take that as a yes.” 


End file.
